5 Comments for “Intolerance”

Minnesota filmmakers Carl and Angel Larsen, owners of Telescope Media Group, gladly serve all people but desire to make wedding videos that only include opposite-sex couples.

Even I find that argument strange for this kind of business. I take it they do more than weddings.

Well, this is basically the Trump wall thing: they won the injunction.

Telescope Media Group will not make films that, in their view, “contradict biblical truth; promote sexual immorality; support the destruction of unborn children; promote racism or racial division; incite violence; degrade women; or promote any conception of marriage other than as a lifelong institution between one man and one woman.”

Oh, right, the art thing. I see what the problem is. This is actually an easy case.

Anyone can produce any sort of art they want under the First Amendment.

There is no difference between the freedom to produce any sort of art one wants, and not producing the art one does not want to produce. Get over the emotional reaction to the word “no”, it is logically expressed just as easily as the range of art one wants to produce.

Then we reach whether, should the art have value to other people, that art can be sold–the range of any sort of art one wants to produce–for profit, without violating an anti-discrimination law. That’s an easy no as well.

Where we begin to have lawsuits is where the art is not just sold, but contracted in advance. A business having established itself expands and becomes a made to order business. Does the ability to receive orders in advance, to establish contracts, yet remain within the same range of any sort of art one wants to produce, transform the production of art into something that is discriminatory? In order to say yes, one must find a difference between contracted and non-contracted work that is not entirely explained by the mere size of the business. Because then you are creating a situation in which the law does not apply differently based on the size of the business.

Q: I find it very hard to believe an “artist” goes into a for profit business just because someone saw their talent and they learned they can make money off of it.

A: You’re an idiot. How does someone even recognize oneself as artist in the first place, s/he picked a random business to start up as and happened to guess right? Someone else saw the emerging artist’s work and told them, “You got a talent.”

Q: What about the “artist” who decided to “convert” late in life and change what they “want” to make?
A: What about protecting the “artist” who wanted to limit their production from the beginning? Can you protect one but not the other? That’s not what equal treatment under the law is about.

Isn’t this the couple who only went into the wedding-film business so the ADF could claim grounds to sue the state over it’s non-discrimination law? No one is suing them, no one has tried to sue them. They only wanted to “expand their business” because ADF needed a test case.

So I’ll have to beg pardon, but this couple gets no sympathy from me regardless of how the case turns out, because they literally asked for this.

That said, these judges are a bunch of cowards. If these folk’s “artistic message” is an out to non-discrimination law that covers gay folk, then it’s also an out to non-discrimination law that covers everyone else. So either strike down all non-discrimination law, or rule that this kind of business isn’t a public accommodation.

But giving a carve-out isn’t defensible. Either we all have to play nice, or we all get to reach for the long knives.

If these folk’s “artistic message” is an out to non-discrimination law that covers gay folk, then it’s also an out to non-discrimination law that covers everyone else. So either strike down all non-discrimination law, or rule that this kind of business isn’t a public accommodation.

In general, courts will not decide issues more broadly than the facts of a specific circumstance require. But (most) judges are not blind to constitutional principles, and (most) give at least some thought to the implications of a narrow ruling (see, for example, Justice Scalia’s dissent in Lawrence, in which he made it clear that Lawrence would lead, inevitably, to Obergefell).

Keep in mind that the long-term conservative Christian goal is to eliminate public accomodations laws altogether, as was demonstrated by the Houston ordinance fights of a few years ago. It won’t stop with gays and lesbians, and it won’t stop with marriage.

1. I am impressed that the small business had standing to sue, given the fact that the state of Minnesota had not actually suggested that they violated any state law.

2. The Minnesota Human Rights Act covers both sexual orientation and gender identity and has done so since 1993. It had the backing of both Republican and DFL Governors to give you an idea of how things were back then.

3. I am less concerned about a hypothetical situation and more worried about the fact that LGBT people do not have protections — in many cases — when it comes to employment and housing.

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